Pass The Rice
by Mr Sinister
Summary: Angel and Psylocke enjoy a night on the town... this is where I get a little mushy, folks :)


**__**

Pass The Rice

"Table for two, please, Jacques," I say to the headwaiter as he greets us at the entrance of the elegant, exclusive French restaurant where I have a regular table set aside for myself and a guest every week. Occasionally I use it to entertain clients of Worthington Industries, but tonight, Betsy is on my arm. She is dressed in a full-length black velvet dress with three-inch heels, a diamond necklace that I gave her for our first anniversary, and her hair piled atop her head instead of flowing free as it usually does. She felt that she wanted a change for this evening, and who am I to disagree? She'd look wonderful to me whatever she looked like. 

Quickly, Jacques shows us to my table, which is set at the back of the restaurant to help avoid prying eyes and keep rubberneckers to a minimum. I like my privacy just as much as the next blue-skinned angel-winged mutant, thank you very much, and I don't like people gawking unnecessarily – not when I have important business to conduct, and certainly not when I'm with the woman I love. He pulls Betsy's chair out for her and she sits, thanking him in her cultured British accent as she does so, laying her coat over the back of the chair next to her. 

"Thank you, Jacques," I say. "Could you bring us a bottle of champagne on ice, please?"

"Of course, Mr Worthington, at once," he says. I keep telling him to just call me Warren, since I've known him for so many years, but his training is often too hard for him to ignore. Betsy picks up one of the menus that has been left for us and starts to pore over the selection of dishes that are available to us.

"I think… I think I will have the duck," she says, tapping the side of her cheek with a fingertip. Then, setting the menu down beside her plate, she says, "What about you, sweetheart?"

I pick up the menu that the headwaiter had put down by my plate and run my finger down the listings towards my favourite dish – the one that the chef here can really out-do himself on every single time I order it.

"Plain steak," I say. "Bloody as hell and served with nothing but the best American fries." Betsy rolls her eyes.

"You are so _nouveau riche,_" she says with a wry little smile. "I don't know how you've managed to hold onto your money for so long."

"Good management and a clean tie every morning," I say. "My dad used to swear by it."

"Is that all?" Betsy says, raising an elegantly curved eyebrow. "Pardon me if I'm a little sceptical."

"Well, it helps if you have a damned good accountant, too," I admit. "It was one of the first things Dad told me about running a business. He made sure that I knew exactly what to do when it came to making a profit and keeping my company together. I have a lot to be thankful for." 

"It certainly sounds like it." Betsy smiles again. "Here comes our champagne." She points behind me towards Jacques, who is heading our way with a trolley, upon which is a notepad, a bucket filled with ice and a large bottle of the most expensive champagne this restaurant sells. Jacques pops the cork off the top of the bottle with an expert touch, making sure that nobody gets hurt as the cork bursts from the bottle's neck with a considerable amount of force. He offers to pour it for us as he takes our orders, but I wave him away, slipping him a little extra something to make sure that we are not disturbed unless absolutely necessary. Betsy pretends not to notice, even though she saw me slide the hundred-dollar bill into Jacques' hand as I shook it to thank him. When he has gone, she smiles in a naughty way to me, as if she has been caught with her hand in the cookie jar.

"You really didn't have to do that, you know," she says. "I could have made everybody forget we were here until we'd left. It would have been cheaper, you know."

"That's not the point. I don't want you using your powers tonight," I tell her. "This isn't a team thing. This is just you and me. We don't need our powers right now – not to enjoy a nice, normal date. Do you promise not to make people not see us?"

"I'll think about it," she says. "As long as you promise not to fly off after any supervillains." 

"Deal," I say. "Right now I can't think of anything I'd rather do less." I pick up the bottle of champagne and pour her a generous glassful. She takes it from me and sips genteelly from the edge of the glass.

"That _is_ good," she says. "We should ask them if we could buy a bottle to take home. I'm sure it would go down well at Christmas, or a birthday. Scott has one coming up, doesn't he?"

"Yes, he does," I reply. I feel ashamed that I've lost track of how old one of my oldest friends is over the years of fighting and moving from place to place – and being on and off the team hasn't helped, either, even though we've written each other pages and pages of letters and emails over the years. "How old is he, anyway?"

"You don't know?" Betsy is genuinely surprised. "He's twenty six." 

"Only twenty six?" That surprises me, too. Judging by what the poor guy's had to go through, you'd think he was ten times that, sometimes. "I thought he was older than that."

"Me too, but apparently he's just got an old face. Jean tells me survey people wanting thirtysomethings for research approach him all the time when the two of them are doing their shopping in the city. Jean says it's beginning to get on his nerves."

"There's a surprise," I say, pouring myself some of the champagne and swallowing a mouthful. The bubbles fizz delicately against my tongue, and I enjoy the flavour of the wine as it slides down my throat. "It'd get on mine, too, if it happened all the time."

"Well you don't have to worry about it, with those boyish good looks of yours," Betsy says, sipping from her drink again and licking her lips. "They'll steer clear of you until you're well into your fifties."

"Well, I don't think they'd come near me in the first place, Betts. Blue skin and wings don't exactly make you ideal survey material."

"Neither does having purple hair or a mystical tattoo over your left eye, but I still get stopped in the street by people wanting to ask me which brand of beer I like to buy," Betsy counters, like an expert swordswoman – which, of course, she is. "They do have to consider the whole picture, you know."

"I guess so," I concede. "Even the freaks have to be counted, huh?"

"Precisely," Betsy answers, laughing. "Be proud to show yourself!"

"You know what, Betts, I might just do that," I say, and, reaching into my pocket, I find the small Shi'Ar holographic image-inducer that I usually wear for occasions like this, and slide its power switch to its "off" position. My Caucasian skin fades to its everyday blue and I am revealed in all my mutant glory for all the customers in the restaurant to see, my wings poking through the special slits in the back of my suit and resting either side of the back of my chair. Some of them mutter things just loud enough for me to hear, but what they have to say is old news – it's only stuff that I heard as a young man, stuff that doesn't even bother me any more. I can hear them splutter and cough and fall over themselves to leave, but that doesn't bother me now, either. Let them be ignorant; I don't care. Not right now. 

"There – don't you feel better?" Betsy says.

"Much," I tell her, and I do. I don't like having to conceal what I am, even if it's sometimes an unpleasant reminder of what I've been through over the years – why should I be ashamed of my being a mutant? My wings are beautiful. I shouldn't have to hide them from the world. I just wish more people could see in them what I see. What Betsy sees.

"Good," she replies, and then looks around the restaurant, which seems to be a lot more cavernous than I've ever seen it before. I'm afraid to speak up in case there's an echo. "It doesn't look like we'll be disturbed after all, though, doesn't it? I told you that you would have been better off saving that hundred dollars." She has a point, I have to admit. I smile wistfully, and shrug my shoulders, causing a couple of feathers to shake themselves loose and flutter to the floor.

"It looks that way, doesn't it? Does this make me look like an idiot?"

Betsy twists her mouth to the side, as if considering the point, even though I already know her answer. "I'm afraid so, Warren. Not that that's much of a stretch." She winks wickedly at me and sips her drink.

"I feel so wounded." I say, in mock-confusion. "Why do I do this to myself?"

"Because you love me, that's why," she says with total confidence. 

"Oh. Yeah. Strike me dead, oh Lord, and spare me this pain!" I raise my hands above my head as if beseeching God to send a thunderbolt into my skull. Betsy raises an eyebrow.

"You're lucky you're gorgeous," she says, deadpan. "You can't tell a joke for peanuts."

I'm just about to open my mouth to protest when our food arrives. My steak is, as usual, swimming in meat juices and smells as if it has been sent from Heaven itself. Betsy's duck looks equally mouth-watering and I can see her picking her knife and fork up eagerly as Jacques puts her plate down in front of her. "Thank you so much," she says, her face beaming with genuine heartfelt gratitude. Jacques shrugs and smiles, and bows from the waist slightly.

_"De rien, mademoiselle,"_ he says in his heavily-accented French. "Enjoy your meal."

"Oh, I will, don't worry about that," Betsy says firmly._ "Merci, monsieur."_ Jacques smiles again and then leaves us to eat. Picking up my razor-sharp steak knife, I slice into my meat. It spills flavoursome juices all over the plate, and I can smell its wonderful aroma even more strongly now than I could before. Betsy takes a delicate slice from her smaller piece of meat and puts it in her mouth in a very precise way. Even without her original body, her etiquette lessons are a hard drill to forget. She doesn't even realise that she's doing it, I don't think.

_Actually, smarty-pants, I do know. I just think this way is better than shovelling food into your mouth like a bloody digger. Mentioning no names._

"What can I say, Betsy?" I reply. "It's the American Way."

_Which is why,_ and she finishes chewing, "which is why I'm glad I will never be an American."

"Come on Betsy, surely we're not all _that_ bad," I ask. "Come on. I bet you can name at least five things that you like about this country."

"Well, you _are_ always so relentlessly cheerful, I suppose. And you do have the most wonderful weather. It's the best sunshine I think I've ever seen." She puts down her knife and fork, and rests her hand on her chin. "I think Sheryl Crow is one of the best women artists singing today. I like David Duchovny. And there's always you, sweetheart. I like you best of all." She smiles coyly. I give her a little round of applause.

"See? You can do it if you try." She takes another mouthful of duck and cranberry sauce, and says _Now you do it about Britain. Let's see if you picked anything up the last time we visited Brian and Meggan, shall we? And the Royal Family doesn't count._

_Oh boy… _I rack my brains trying to think of things that I liked about Britain. "Come on, Betts, this isn't really fair. You've been here a lot longer than I've been in Britain." She shakes her head.

_Fair's fair, Warren. You can do it if you try._ She grins at me. _If it makes you feel any better, I don't think there's much in Britain that you'd like._

"Well, let's see. There's the Rolling Stones – I like them."

"Good. Keep going."

"Catherine Zeta Jones. I _really _like her."

"Settle down, Warren – I hear she's taken."

"So's David Duchovny."

"Details, details. Keep going."

"Ah… I like the trees in the autumn. Does that count? They do look wonderful, after all."

"I'll give you that. Come on, Warren – you're nearly there."

"I like soccer."

Betsy blinks, and gives me a frosty look. "For the last time, Warren, it's football!" Sighing, seeing I'm a lost cause as far as that particular subject goes, she holds up a forefinger. "All right. One more, and we'll call it even."

"One more… okay, I think you are without a doubt the single best thing that Britain has produced within the last twenty years." I think she'd have skinned me alive if I hadn't said that.

"Flatterer," she says. "But I'm glad you said it."

"Me too." I take another few bites of my steak, and take a sip of my wine, relieved that I don't have to think so hard any more – the champagne is starting to go to my head a little, and trying to think isn't a good idea. Which makes what I'm about to do seem even more insane.

The little velvet-covered box in my pocket is getting heavier by the moment, it seems. The diamond and amethyst ring I bought for her last week seems to be multiplying its mass every second. I have to find the right way to ask her, but I'm not sure how.

The hell with it. There's only one proper way to do this.

I stand up, shift myself so that I'm standing in front of Betsy, bring out the little box and open it to reveal the ring, and get down on one knee.

"Betsy Braddock, will you do me the honour of becoming my wife?"

Betsy pauses, almost choking on the mouthful she had been about to swallow, and coughs. "I wondered what it was I could feel you hiding," she says, a look of enlightenment crossing her face. "I'm curious, Warren – why such a big step? I thought we were happy as we are."

"We _are_ happy," I say, "but I want to show the world how much we love each other. I've been thinking about this for a while now, Betts – I felt what it was like to be without you when the Undercloaks took you away, and I couldn't bear it. I felt like a shell of what I'd been before – empty and useless. It hurt so much, Betsy – I don't think I could go through it again. I don't want to lose you."

Betsy shakes her head and looks a little uncomfortable. "I don't want to lose you either, Warren – I truly don't – but why marriage? Surely we can carry on as we are, without formalities getting in the way?" 

Seeing this is going nowhere fast, I move back up onto my chair and take Betsy's hand. "It's not just about formalities, Betts. We've been living with each other for almost a year now, and we've been through so much together, it's pretty obvious – to me at least – that we should make some kind of public commitment to our future. Wouldn't you like to show our friends what we mean to each other?"

"I think we do that every day, Warren. They know how we feel. We don't _need_ to show anybody." She pauses. "Please just look at it from my point of view, sweetheart – you've just given me a map for the rest of my life. How do you think that makes me feel?"

For once, I'm speechless. She does have a point, I have to admit.

_Exactly, Warren. And that's why I'm doing this._ Her telepathic voice sounds like music in my mind, birdsong and Brahms and Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony all wrapped into one. Not for the first time, it astounds me with its sheer beauty. _Don't you think you should have considered how I might react, instead of going right ahead and buying this ring?_ She sighs. "I don't want to hurt you, sweetheart, I really don't, but –"

"But what?" I finish. "I love you, Betsy, and I'm pretty sure that you love me. Why won't you accept our marriage as our declaration of that?"

"Do you want me to be honest, Warren?" she asks. "It frightens me. That's what this is all about. If I stand up in a church and say 'I do', I'd be saying it in front of everyone who loves me. I'd be saying it in front of everyone that loves us both, for that matter. I'd be saying it to a priest and to God, and… I'm afraid of what might happen after that, Warren. I'm afraid of what might happen if we didn't last as long as we thought we might. What if 'till death do us part' doesn't mean much to either of us in the long run, or if that moment arrives far sooner than it should? That thought terrifies me. I'm afraid I might hurt you, and I'm afraid of what might happen to me. We lead such unpredictable lives, Warren – what if we had children, and one of us actively stayed on the team while the other retired to look after them? What would happen if that person were maimed or killed? How do you think that would make the one that was left feel? I know that if I lost you I'd be devastated. I wouldn't want to raise a baby by myself, with only a few photographs, a black marble headstone and a ruined, bloodstained costume to show them when they were old enough to ask why they didn't have a daddy." She sighs. "Do you see what I'm getting at, Warren?"

"Yes, Betsy," I say, "because it's a valid point, and to be honest I've had a few of the same concerns as you. I've thought about that, too, and I know that if it came down to a choice between staying as one of the team and raising a family with you, I'd choose you every time. I wouldn't want to put our kids, if we do ever have them, through that kind of pain. It wouldn't be fair to them or to you. What I'm getting at, Betts, is that you don't have to be afraid. Not of this, and not of me. I promise I'll never leave you. You and me, kid – we're gonna be contenders, I promise." I watch her beautiful face split into a wide smile at that, as she laughs despite herself.

"You're mad, Warren Worthington."

"I'm American. It's practically a requirement."

"You didn't have to tell _me_ that. I'm a telepath, remember?" She smiles, and I am glad that this situation has been defused – I don't want it to boil over into a huge argument. 

"I guess so," I say. "Will you think about this, though, Betsy? I'll stand by you whatever you decide, you know that – I just want you to be happy."

"I know, Warren, and I promise you that you'll have your answer when I've looked at it from every point of view that I can. Promise you'll be patient?"

I hold up my hand, as if taking the oath in court. "I promise. Just… don't take too long, okay?" Betsy nods.

"I won't, my darling. I promise, too." She kisses me, tenderly, and though I'm disappointed that this hasn't been as straightforward as I wanted it to be, I've got hope for the future.

And not for the first time since I fell in love with Betsy, the future looks bright, like a star.


End file.
